Twenty-fourth Sunday – Ordinary Time Cycle C
Reflecting on Luke 15:1-32
Even though we live in a religious country with a strong religious heritage, the very core of religious faith―that a loving God actually exists and actually longs for communion with us―seems to elude us.
Return of the Prodigal Son (Rembrandt) c.1669
And so we’ve come around again to the great Lukan parables of the lost coin, the lost sheep, and the lost son. (This only happens in Year C, where we heard the story on the Fourth Sunday of Lent and again today.) What will it take for us to really hear that the Hound of Heaven will chase us through the alleyways of our lives in order to catch us and look us in the eye and say, for the millionth time, but didn’t you know that everything I have is yours?
So let’s let Francis Thompson, tortured opium addict and believer in God’s mercy, remind us once again:
I fled Him, down the nights and down the days; I fled Him, down the arches of the years;
I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways of my own mind; and in the midst of tears I hid from Him….
I wonder. Do you suppose that Lost Sheep was watching in the canyons to see if the shepherd would really leave everything to find her? How delicious that must have felt, to hear him calling for her, and hear the relief in his voice when she stepped from her hiding place and he wrapped her up in his arms and carried her home.
Hey, do you know someone who’s ready to be found? It’s not easy to step out of the dark canyon. It takes a lot of humility to admit that we are loved that much.
Sharing God’s Word at Home
Do you recall a time of being “found”?
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I have come to light a fire on the earth; how I wish it were already burning (Lk.12:49).